Pakistani militants have been known to select prominent foreign targets within Pakistan, as the Mumbai terrorists did last week. But few, if any, Pakistani militants have been known until now specifically to target Israelis. I say, Israelis rather than Jews because the single surviving terrorist noted that they chose Chabad House to avenge the suffering of the Palestinians. Therefore, the attack was anti-Israeli, though not necessarily antisemitic.

There is so much religious hatred in the Middle East that I think it's important to be precise in analysing what happened in Mumbai. For many Jews and some non-Jews, it will not matter whether the terrorists murdered Gabriel and Rivka Holtzberg because they were Jewish or Israeli. For them, the two concepts are virtually indistinguishable. But the distinction is important.

The ambitiousness and sheer drama of the attack was stupendous. These were men who were not out simply to seek revenge. They were out to shock the world into confronting their cause and their agenda. That is why I believe they chose to attack Chabad House. Attacking a target perceived as Israeli allows the terrorists to enlarge their grievance and the drama of their cause. Instead of merely avenging India's suppression of Muslim Kashmir, they were seeking redress for crimes against Palestine as well. This strikes me as a theme that would resonate with al-Qaida, though I have seen no credible evidence that ties the attacks to the group.

So in a sense I see Chabad House as target chosen quite cynically, allowing the terrorists to appropriate a popular Islamist cause. Besides, killing Israelis and other foreigners would bring even more notoriety and media attention to their cause than simply killing Indians, as they have done in Mumbai and New Dehli in the past. So the Holtzbergs were pawns in a much larger geopolitical game played out between India and Pakistan. Unfortunately, Jews have much historical experience being exploited for the sake of the fanaticism or whims of kings, tsars and emperors.

We need to understand that … our world, that has been attacked. And it doesn't matter if it's happened in India or somewhere else. We have here radical Islamic elements who do not accept either our existence or the values of the western world. And only when incidents of this sort occur is it suddenly understood from conversations with leaders from around the entire world that we are actually party to the same battle.

What should really be understood is that, as with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, here we have essentially a political/territorial conflict between Pakistan and India over Kashmir that has been turned by Hindu and Muslim extremists on both sides into a religious crusade.

The same is true of Israel-Palestine. Israel's nationalist leaders would like nothing more than to piggyback their own cause onto the western jihad against radical Islam. They conveniently label Palestinian militants as radical Islamists or jihadis, when Palestinians themselves largely do not recognise or accept the terms. While it is true that Gaza is ruled by Hamas, which is a movement with a religious identity, most Hamas leaders eschew the language of religious jihad to portray their struggle.

The Mumbai attackers, like political terrorists everywhere, desperately seek to destabilise the enemy while paralysing the will to compromise and negotiate an end to conflict. This is as true of Israel as it is of Pakistan. India and Pakistan are on a road to eventual rapprochement after 60 years of bloodshed. Lashkar e Taiba, in order to realise its dreams of Islamic supremacy, must throw a spanner in the works. That is why both sides must tread extremely carefully. To give in to revenge or bellicose nationalism would play right into the terrorists' hands.

Every fibre of my being wishes that this story is false. If it isn't, it will set back Jewish-Muslim relations years, if not decades. Not to mention that it will further confirm Israeli Jews in the conviction that it is simply impossible to live in peace with the region's Muslims.

Terrorism is a Rorschach test onto which everyone projects his own prejudices, fears, ideology and hate. It is no accident that among the first media sources to report the torture claim outside of India is Arutz Sheva, an Israeli rightist news site that will amplify it throughout Israel and the Jewish Diaspora. So Tzipi Livni and Arutz Sheva need to see the Chabad House attack as emblems of Muslim perfidy and antisemitic hate. It allows them to either win an election (in her case) or to argue that Israel must battle to the death with the Palestinians and never give an inch (in Arutz Sheva's case). That is why we must deny them the opportunity by cutting through the fog of terror and laying bare the essentials of this case.

The terror attack, whether or not torture was involved, was a brutal, heinous and impermissible violation of the norms of human civilisation. Though the 10 terrorists have been killed, undoubtedly there are many still alive who abetted their evil deeds. There certainly is either a single person or cabal who conceived of the plan. Since this crime crossed international borders, I'd encourage India and Pakistan to try them before an international court of justice. If we wish to denounce this deed in the broadest and most profound possible terms, nothing can do that better than international justice.

There is a thing or two that India can learn from Israel and other nations beset with Islamist terror. It seems clear that neither India nor Mumbai were the least prepared for such an attack. They'd taken almost no precautions to harden themselves as a potential target. Hotels had little security presence on-hand that would mount a serious deterrent.

Once the attack was underway, the ill-preparedness of the police became clear. Even when crack anti-terror units arrived, the New York Times reveals, they were without proper sniper scopes that would allow them to distinguish between civilians and the terrorists in the hotel. They were also without appropriate bullet proof vests that would allow them to take the attack to the killers. The fact that it took the authorities three days to rout 10 terrorists is a sad commentary on India's anti-terror capabilities.

Even the Chabad movement should taken to task for not providing greater security for its facility. In a city already beset by past terror attacks, any target perceived as Jewish or Israeli (not just Israeli government buildings) should have had serious surveillance (ie security cameras) and the ability to lock itself down quickly. This does not appear to have been the case at Chabad House. There are many lessons to be learned to ensure no future Gabriel or Rivka Holtzbergs will be forced to give up their lives for the sake of martyrdom.